Mary Jane and the Monkey
by JWood201
Summary: Although he had a plan, it was still a Gilligan plan. And as far as Mary Ann was concerned, the only thing more unpredictable than a Gilligan plan was a Gilligan plan based on one of Aunt Martha's stories. During "The Hunter."
1. The Story

**Mary Jane and the Monkey**

Fear not, callensensei gave me permission to write in the Hunterfic subgenre. In fact, she pretty much challenged me to write a Mary Ann Hunterfic (wisely or unwisely is yet to be determined). Thanks for the encouragement and I hope it's worthy. And, look, I got the rest of the characters in it too!

_If you can't sleep, I'll be there in your dreams  
__I'll be there in your dreams if you can't sleep at all  
__And in your dreams, I'll touch your cheek  
__And lay my head on your shoulder  
__Goodbye shadows  
__Goodbye shadows  
__If you're far away, if you can't see my face  
__If the world is cold, but the sun shines the same  
__Shut your eyes, there are bluer skies  
__For you're embraced in my heart.  
_"If You Can't Sleep," She & Him

**One**

She tore through the jungle as fast as her petite legs would carry her, arms pumping, leaping over fallen logs and ducking under low-hanging branches with a deftness she didn't know she possessed and had never needed on the flat open prairie. The sounds of her three friends screaming after her faded into the distance and under the bass drumming of her heart in her ears. She hurdled over a small stream and skidded briefly on wet leaves, wishing distantly that she had chosen not to wear a skirt that day.

After the Skipper captured Ramoo and liberated the five remaining castaways, he and the Professor went off in search of Gilligan and Kincaid, instructing Mr. Howell to take the women to the cave they used to ride out the last hurricane and to stay put and that's an order!

And yet here she was, sprinting through the jungle, not sure exactly where she was going or what she was going to do once she got there, but nonetheless surging in the general direction of her best friend and a madman with a rifle. She heard Ginger bellow her name one final time, followed by muffled cursing from Mr. Howell, which she was sure was accompanied by frustrated foot stomping. She pictured Mrs. Howell shrieking at her husband, pointing off into the foliage with an opera-gloved hand clutching a delicate handkerchief, demanding that he go after her.

But he could never catch her. She was done feeling useless.

_You are braver than you believe..._ played on a loop in her head, partially for her own benefit, but mostly she hoped the mantra would rise from her consciousness into the ether and alight on an exhausted Gilligan, hiding somewhere in the jungle, if she just concentrated hard enough.

Mary Ann reached out and grabbed a skinny palm tree, using it to propel herself around the trunk and down the path that continued at a sharp angle down a steep hill. She crossed a small clearing in four easy strides, cheerful sunlight briefly blinding her, and plunged deep into the jungle again.

The night before the hunt, Mary Ann snuck out of her hut after Ginger finally fell into a nervous and restless sleep. The movie star had stormed through the door two hours earlier, hurled the empty bottle that had contained the sleeping potion for Kincaid across the room, and proceeded to wash her face repeatedly, nearly scrubbing it raw where the hunter had kissed her.

Mary Ann saw a candle flickering through the window of the hut Kincaid had commandeered and quickly stole across their camp. Ramoo stood guard by the door and watched her carefully as she approached, but made no move to stop her as she knocked lightly.

"What?"

Mary Ann slid halfway into the hut, gripping the bamboo door tightly in white-knuckled hands. Kincaid sat twisted towards the door on a stool in the corner, his rifle in pieces in his lap.

"Didn't your friends tell you how they failed to bribe and drug me? What are you going to do, kill me with kindness?"

"I just want to see him," she whispered, surprised at how low her own voice sounded. She wasn't sure Kincaid even heard her until he finally shrugged.

"Knock yourself out, sweetheart. But he was the unwitting recipient of the sleeping potion your redheaded friend brought for me, so I'm afraid he won't be much of a conversationalist."

Mary Ann pulled her gaze from Kincaid and looked around the hut for the first time. In a dark corner, barely illuminated by the glimmering candlelight, Gilligan lay fast asleep on his side, curled in protectively on himself. Mary Ann could feel Kincaid's eyes on her as she crossed to the small bamboo cot and tugged self-consciously on the Professor's extra shirt that she used as pajamas, realizing too late that she probably should have gotten dressed before leaving her hut.

"Gilligan." He whimpered in his sleep and his brow furrowed. Mary Ann crouched down by the cot and laid her hand tenderly on his cheek. "It's me," she whispered and his features immediately unknotted, his whole body relaxing slightly.

Mary Ann sat down on the cot and slid back until she was leaning against the wall, her bare feet hanging suspended in the air. She gently lifted Gilligan's head and laid it in her lap, his cheek warm on her leg despite the sharp chill in the night air. She took off his hat and set it aside, brushing his bangs out of his eyes, and laid her other arm across his side.

Gilligan immediately caught her hand like a child grabbing unconsciously in a fitful sleep for his security blanket and pulled it to his chest, holding on for dear life. Mary Ann could feel his heart hammering under her palm and pressed down as if she could somehow contain it, wondering how he was managing to sleep at all, even under the influence of the sleeping tonic. But she was grateful too; he needed all the rest he could get if he was going to elude the hunter for twenty-four hours straight.

Mary Ann glanced up at Kincaid, who had been watching them blankly. When her gaze met his, Kincaid gave her one of his most charming grins and turned back to cleaning his rifle. Mary Ann cringed and concentrated again on the sailor sleeping in her lap, running her hand gently over his forehead.

"Don't you have a best friend, Mr. Kincaid?"

"You mean besides Ramoo? I don't want one. Friendships make you soft, dull your senses. I need to be on top of my game at all times." He flashed her another slimy smile, but she wasn't paying any attention to him and he went back to work.

Mary Ann sighed and tried not to think about the fact that after tomorrow she might not have one either. "That's sad."

A nightjar sang somewhere out in the jungle and after a moment Mary Ann began to hum quietly and wildly off-key. Gilligan smiled slightly in his sleep and she swatted him lightly on the top of his head. "Don't make fun of me, Gilligan."

Mary Ann peered up at Kincaid, who was hiding a laugh in the barrel of his rifle, and frowned. She glanced around the hut and watched the candlelight glint ominously on the smooth clean metal of Kincaid's gun. Mary Ann shivered involuntarily and turned back to Gilligan, running her fingers through his hair, wanting nothing more than to comfort the young man somehow.

She had never felt so useless in her whole life.

She suddenly remembered one night when she was seven years old and violently ill with the flu. She lay coiled up on the couch, her head in her Aunt Martha's lap and a dog curled up at her feet, in and out of feverish sleep. Little Mary Ann clutched her aunt's hand as the older woman spent the entire night telling her niece stories in her comforting Kansas drawl.

"Once upon a time," Mary Ann began quietly, "there was a little girl who lived on a farm in Oklahoma named Mary Jane Winters." Gilligan smiled and Mary Ann knew that, if he was awake, this was the point in the story where he would burst out laughing. She heard him cackling in her head, saw him sitting cross-legged on the ground before her like an expectant preschooler, pulling his hat down over his face as he giggled. Mary Ann would plant her hands on her hips and glare at him. "Be quiet, Gilligan!" she would scold, "It's a good story. Now, listen!"

"Mary Jane had lots of animals on her farm," she continued, "but her favorite was a little monkey, whom she loved more than anything." This was the point in the story where Gilligan would interrupt her to ask what a monkey was doing on a farm in Oklahoma. Mary Ann would sigh and ask him what difference it made and explain, if he must know, that as a little girl she really wanted a monkey so Aunt Martha would put them in her stories and she told him this every time she told this story, so would Gilligan please just keep his mouth shut and let her finish?

Every so often when the castaways were gathered around the fire after dinner talking and singing songs, thousands of tiny stars glittering brightly overhead, Gilligan would ask for a Mary Ann story and before anyone else could place a request, he would demand to hear about Mary Jane and the monkey. Again. The other castaways would groan and one-by-one wander away to turn in for the night, Mr. Howell remarking under his breath about Gilligan's assured short-term memory loss. As they disappeared through their red-curtained French doors, his wife would pat him on the shoulder and sweetly suggest he donate one of the pills he takes for such an ailment to the poor boy and Howell would thunder that he takes no such thing and that his memory is perfect and would Lovey please remind him where he left Teddy this morning? Eventually, Gilligan and Mary Ann would be alone by the fire, she regaling him with the ridiculous stories her aunt made up for her and he occasionally falling asleep sitting up in the sand.

"He wasn't the bravest or the strongest or the smartest and he was always falling out of trees, so the other animals made fun of him. Especially the beautiful red-feathered chicken and the two old goats," Mary Ann quickly inserted this unscripted addendum and she ignored the short laugh from Kincaid's corner.

"But he was fast and he was clever and Mary Jane loved him dearly. When the other animals taunted him, Mary Jane would take him in her arms and remind him, 'You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.'"

This was the point in the story where little Mary Ann would interrupt her aunt to inform her that that quote was from _Winnie the Pooh_. Martha Summers would sniff once, offended, and notify her niece that A. A. Milne stole that gem of wisdom from her. Mary Ann and her cousins would roll their eyes at one another and decided that from now on they'd be better off if they kept quiet.

"One day a mean old bobcat showed up on the farm and threatened to gobble up all the animals, but especially the monkey." Mary Ann pointedly glanced up at Kincaid. He was still focused on his rifle, but a self-satisfied smile played on his features.

"The bobcat chased him all over the farm until the monkey had an idea. As he ran past the house, the bobcat stopped and asked Mary Jane where the monkey had gone. The little girl shrugged and said she thought she saw him go behind the barn. 'Be careful, Mr. Bobcat,' she added, 'There might be lions.'"

At this point Mary Ann would interrupt herself and demand why Gilligan hadn't interrupted her to ask about the lions. Gilligan would give her a lopsided smile and shrug and say that if she wanted there to be lions in Oklahoma, then that was good enough for him.

"But the bobcat knew there were no lions in Oklahoma. And even if there were, he surely could defeat them. He laughed uproariously at the idea and ran confidently past the barn where he was promptly eaten by a lion."

The first time Mary Ann told this story, the other castaways met the ending with deafening silence, much as her cousins on the farm had when she related it to them. The oldest boy laughed, used to his mother's dreadful attempts at storytelling. The others stared at her incredulously until the littlest Summers planted her hands on her hips. "That's it?" she demanded and promptly apologized to her dog for making him sit through that.

The Skipper and Mr. Howell exchanged sidelong glances before the millionaire leaned forward on the table diplomatically. "That's it?"

"Oh, dear," was all his wife could muster.

"Geez, Mary Ann," Ginger sighed, "I've been in some real stinky movies, but that story takes the cake."

"What? It's about not underestimating the little guy. It's not _that_ bad."

"I liked it," Gilligan beamed from the other end of the table.

"You would!" the Skipper shot back as he pointed emphatically at the first mate, clutching his hat to his head when it began to abandon him.

The Professor merely shook his head, lost, words escaping him as he attempted to justify what he had just heard.

Mary Ann crossed her arms defiantly across her chest. "It's a fable. It's not supposed to make sense."

"I liked it," Gilligan repeated somewhat less enthusiastically as the Howells rose to their feet, she shushing him as he muttered something about Aunt Martha dipping into the moonshine and then chortling at his own joke.

"That's it?"

Mary Ann's head snapped up at the question. Lost in her story and the memories that accompany it, she had almost forgotten that Kincaid was in the hut.

Mary Ann bristled, frowning. "It's a fable. I wouldn't expect you to be able to find the moral of the story."

"Oh, I get it, don't worry. Now get out. I have a long day ahead of me and I need my beauty sleep." Kincaid finished reassembling his rifle and gave it one final wipe with the cloth, admiring the way the bright shiny metal caught the candlelight.

Mary Ann ignored him and continued brushing Gilligan's hair from his eyes. Kincaid stood and advanced on the two castaways, rifle and ire raised. "I thought I asked you nicely, Mary Ann. Out!" he suddenly yelled.

Mary Ann flinched violently and froze, gaping at Kincaid as Ramoo peered through the window for any sign of trouble. After a moment, Mary Ann slowly slid from the cot, gently laying Gilligan's head back on the thin mattress. She tried to slowly pull her hand free, but Gilligan held on tight, both hands clamped around hers in a death grip. In two quick strides, Kincaid was at her side and roughly wrenched her from him. Gilligan gasped in his sleep and tightened his arms around himself, pulling his knees protectively to his chest.

Mary Ann shook Kincaid off and stood up straight, fixing the hunter with a steely glare that rivaled his own. Kincaid almost had to turn away, but she whirled from him first and crouched down by the cot, laying a tender hand on Gilligan's cheek.

"Gilligan. Gilligan, listen to me," she whispered. "Tomorrow when we're not together, there's something that you must remember. You are braver than you believe, stronger than –."

"That's enough."

Mary Ann closed her eyes and took a deep breath before bravely plowing ahead. "But the most important thing is, even if we're apart, I'll always be with you." She took her hand from his cheek and pressed it to his shirt, his heart pounding into her palm. "Right here. We all will."

Mary Ann suddenly felt the barrel of Kincaid's gun on her back and she froze. "I said that's enough," he growled. Mary Ann slowly stood and, keeping her back defiantly to the hunter, she turned not towards the door, but to retrieve a blanket from the foot of the cot and spread it over the first mate's sleeping form. She affectionately tucked the blanket around his shoulders.

Mary Ann leaned over and pressed her lips to his cheek, leaving a lingering kiss near the corner of his lips. "Everything will be okay, Gilligan. I believe in you."

She tore through the jungle now, running on sheer adrenaline. She had no idea if everything would be okay. She highly doubted it. Even if everyone made it out alive, no one would ever be the same.

But she did believe in him. Though it was often a lonely position to be in, she still believed.

Mary Ann had just crested a small hill when she suddenly saw him. A bright red blur a few hundred yards in the distance was running perpendicular to her, still artfully dodging trees and leaping over rocks, but significantly slower than Mary Ann knew he could run under normal circumstances. She could tell he was exhausted even from this distance. Mary Ann collected whatever energy she had left and surged forward, flying down the hill toward him.

Mary Ann was trying to determine the easiest and safest way for her to get his attention when a gunshot rang out.

Mary Ann's heart nearly stopped, her breath catching in her throat.

A throng of birds collectively abandoned the jungle canopy.

And then deafening silence.

It took Mary Ann a moment to realize that her legs were no longer beneath her and that she was heading straight for the ground in what felt like extremely slow motion. The world was absolutely still as she reached desperately into the air in front of her, feet kicking out fruitlessly behind her as she hovered for a millisecond completely parallel to the ground.

Mary Ann caught sight of Gilligan again through the tall jungle grass. He had stopped running too. He saw her and his eyes widened, mouth opening in a silent yell.

Their eyes locked for a split-second before they both hit the ground.


	2. The Idea

**Mary Jane and the Monkey**

_I always thought I'd have another chance  
__And I'd be seeing you again  
__...  
__I didn't know the last time that we met  
__Would be the last time we would meet  
_"Things I Never Said," Gilligan's Island: The Musical

**Two**

Face down in the dirt, Gilligan quickly ran his hands over his back, searching for the wound that he was sure would do him in. He brought his hands around in front of his face. Clean. Gilligan's eyes widened. Kincaid had missed him again.

Gilligan carefully peered over the thicket of towering grass that he dove into for cover and realized with a sharp gasp that Mary Ann had been running toward him when the gunshot rang out and now was nowhere to be seen. Not seeing Kincaid either, Gilligan quickly crawled through the underbrush to where he watched her disappear.

Parting two thick palm leaves, Gilligan discovered her body at the base of a huge tree, absolutely motionless, tall grass waving peacefully in the breeze three feet above her. Gilligan's heart skipped a few beats and then began pounding against his ribcage.

Gilligan hurried to her side and realized with a flood of relief that she was weeping into the dirt, a tiny mud river beginning to form next to her tightly closed eyes. Gilligan quickly looked her over and, not seeing any visible injuries, gently touched her on the shoulder.

Mary Ann's head snapped up. Her eyes searched his for a moment, trying to decide if he was real, if they were alive, or if this was heaven and she wordlessly scrambled into his arms, clutching him tightly. "I thought he got you," she finally whispered into his shoulder.

Gilligan shook his head and wrapped his arms around her. "I thought he got _you_." Gilligan noticed the culprit of her descent, a huge gnarled tree root rising nearly eight inches from the ground next to the trunk, and sighed with gratitude. "Mary Ann, what are you doing h—?"

Mary Ann looked up at him, brows furrowed questioningly. Gilligan silently shook his head, warning her to stay quiet, and nodded towards the clump of grass a hundred yards away that he had used for cover. Kincaid was stalking towards it, gun resting on his shoulder confidently. Mary Ann gasped inaudibly and tightened her arms around him. "Get down!" Gilligan mouthed as he pushed her to the ground amid another mass of tall grass, throwing himself on top of her protectively.

Kincaid sauntered to the spot where he saw Gilligan go down expecting to find his prey either defeated or severely incapacitated. Instead he found a Gilligan-shaped indentation in the grass, but no trace of the first mate and no sign that he had been hit.

From the safety of their own cavern of soaring island grass, Gilligan and Mary Ann clung to each other and listened as Kincaid cursed Gilligan repeatedly, kicking his tall boots irately through the dry grass. Gilligan smirked at Kincaid's frustration and Mary Ann buried her face in his neck.

Kincaid suddenly stopped his tantrum. He cocked his head to one side, listening. The two castaways held their breath as the hunter turned in a slow pivot, surveying the landscape, smelling the air, ears twitching at the slightest sound like a well-trained bloodhound. All of his senses were on high alert as he used his years of experience to determine which way Gilligan had fled. Kincaid finally made what he considered an informed decision and stormed off in the complete opposite direction.

Gilligan and Mary Ann waited until the sound of his footsteps in the brush faded into the distance to exhale. They lay still for a moment, Mary Ann curled against his chest, her fingernails digging into his back and his fingers tangled in her pigtails. Gilligan slowly pushed himself up into a sitting position and shook his head clear. He took Mary Ann's hands to pull her from the ground and she immediately climbed into his lap, gathering him into her arms again. He rested his chin on her shoulder, grateful for the opportunity to rest for a moment.

Mary Ann, however, was ever vigilant. She had no intention of letting him out of her sight until the twenty-four hour hunt was over. She felt useful and helpful just being there with him, to encourage and hold him, as if her delicate arms could somehow protect him from a psychotic hunter. Her optimism increased with every minute that passed; every second that she counted in her head brought them that much closer to being done with this nightmare.

Gilligan suddenly snored loudly and Mary Ann burst out laughing.

Gilligan's eyes flew open and he flinched, reflexively tightening his arms around her. He heard Mary Ann yelp as he knocked the wind out of her before he remembered where he was and how he got there. It took him another second to remember where she was and his newly-rested brain cells allowed him enough normal function to feel slightly uncomfortable.

"Did I fall asleep?"

"A little. Do you feel better?"

He gave the jungle over her shoulder a sheepish smile. "A little. Thanks."

Mary Ann gave him an extra squeeze. "Good. Now let's go. If we stay in one place too long, he's bound to come back."

Mary Ann let go of him and tried to stand, but Gilligan caught her arms, shaking his head. "No, Mary Ann, you gotta go back to the others."

"Don't be silly, Gilligan. I'm not letting you do this alone."

"Silly?" he squeaked, gaping at her. "I'm not being silly, Mary Ann, I'm being serious! You could get killed!"

"So could you!" she shot back. They glared at each other stubbornly, but her bottom lip was beginning to quiver dangerously.

Mary Ann was supposed to be brave and strong for his sake. She had repeated it to herself over and over. She was not going to revert to her weepy emotional self and force Gilligan to reassure her like he always did. Not when he was the one in danger.

Gilligan closed his eyes and shook his head vehemently. "No! No, no, no. I could live with myself if I got killed, but not if anything happened to you. You gotta go back to the others."

"No! I'm going to help you!" Mary Ann managed to blurt out before she was destroyed from within and her face crumbled.

"Mary Ann! Don't cry. Mary Ann, listen." Gilligan took her face in his hands and forced her to look him in the eye. "Listen. You already helped me. A lot. You let me take a nap on you just now. Which I really needed. And you helped me the other night – more than Mr. Howell and Ginger did – just by being there. You helped me sleep through the night. And you told me my favorite story about Mary Jane and the monkey."

Mary Ann tried to laugh, but a strangled wet sob escaped instead. It was disgusting, but Gilligan stayed put, her tears beginning to pool in his hands. "That's such a stupid story," she managed to choke out.

Gilligan grinned. "I love that story."

Mary Ann sniffled dramatically. "I thought you were asleep."

"I was. But I dreamed about you. And the story," he added quickly, looking characteristically embarrassed for a second. "I knew you were there." He paused, smiled to himself, and turned a pale shade of red, but couldn't stop himself from continuing. "When I can't sleep, I think about you so I'll dream that you're telling me the story. That way I know I'll stay asleep to hear the end because it's my favorite part." Mary Ann blinked at him, the tears clinging to her lashes making it impossible to see him clearly. She was trying to decide the best way to reply to his inadvertently adorable admission short of jumping him on the spot when he suddenly gasped. "Mary Ann, I have an idea!"

"What?"

"We can trick Kincaid! Just like Mary Jane and the monkey tricked the bobcat!"

Mary Ann's mind fast forwarded through the story until she recalled the hoax contrived by a little girl and her primate friend and her mouth fell open in a silent gasp. "But we don't have any lions on the island. Not any more, at least."

"But we have something else." Gilligan grinned slyly. "In that thick grove over on the plateau."

Mary Ann's eyes widened as she began to realize what he was planning. "Gilligan, no! You have to stay _away_ from Kincaid, not lure him into some stupid trap!" Mary Ann was becoming more high-pitched and frantic with every sentence she blurted out. "You can't base a plan to save your life on a Martha Summers story! We never let her help us with our homework because she always made up history!" She tried to shake her head, but Gilligan held steady to her cheeks and forced her to look him in the eye again.

"No, Mary Ann, this'll work. I know it. But I need your help. We're a team now. It's just you and me against the world. We're Mary Jane and the monkey." Gilligan paused and shot her an innocent smile. "Which one do you want to be?"

Mary Ann couldn't stop the laugh that burst from her and Gilligan grinned. She laid her hand warmly on his, still cradling her face, and let her gaze drop to the ground between them. "Mary Jane."

"Good. 'Cause I look terrible in pigtails. You know what to do, right?"

Mary Ann looked into his eyes for a long moment, hers gradually refilling with moisture, and finally nodded faintly.

"But you have to promise me that you'll go back to the others after this, okay? No matter what." She felt fresh tears attempting to force their way out and she tried to blink them back. "Promise," he demanded and Mary Ann nodded again, reluctantly.

Gilligan wiped the tears from her cheeks with his thumbs, which Mary Ann felt trembling despite the calm smile he gave her. "Give me fifteen minutes." He carefully parted the tall grass and peered from the safety of their hideout before slipping through the blades and disappearing, leaving Mary Ann alone in the tiny clearing.

Although he had a plan, it was still a Gilligan plan. And as far as Mary Ann was concerned, the only thing more unpredictable than a Gilligan plan was a Gilligan plan based on one of Aunt Martha's stories.

Mary Ann watched the tall blades of grass snap back behind him and sway into place, her fingers gripping the sod beside her, nearly ripping the soft moss from the ground. She couldn't let what could be her last memory of Gilligan be of him leaving her.

What if Kincaid had been waiting for him?

What if he was listening to their entire conversation?

What if he knew their plan?

What if he knocked Gilligan out and dragged him away?

What if Gilligan was already...?

"Gilli—!" was all that escaped her throat before she began suffocating on her own anxiety.

Mary Ann was on the verge of hyperventilating when Gilligan's head finally reappeared through the grass wall and glanced around in confusion. She hadn't moved. She was still kneeling in the moss, sitting on her heels with dirt dusting her light blue sweater, whisps of hair escaping from their pigtails and a cocktail of mascara and tears running down her cheeks.

Gilligan watched terror, shock, and then relief flood over her features at his return and he fell to his knees before her. Mary Ann reached out with shaking hands and ended up with fistfulls of his shirt. She opened her mouth with no acute plans of what to say, but found she still couldn't make a sound anyway. Finally, she forced out three little words:

"Please come back."

Gilligan nodded. "I will." He offered her one last unsteady smile before turning away again.

"Gilligan!"

The instant he knelt before her again, Mary Ann immediately grabbed his jaw and kissed him. She pulled him to her and kissed him like she'd never kissed anyone before.

Like how Horace Higgenbotham had tried to kiss her when they were thirteen and consequently got himself chased through the wheat field by her uncles.

Like she'd never see him again.

Mary Ann was overwhelmed with so many different emotions that she didn't know what else to do. Maybe she was trying to give him some of her energy, her stamina, something. Maybe she was subconsciously taking a page from Ginger's book and trying to convince him not to leave. Or maybe she just couldn't take the chance of never seeing him again without having done it. Maybe she just needed him to know.

When Mary Ann finally released him and opened her eyes, Gilligan was staring at her, mouth hanging open in astonishment. He blinked twice, slowly, and she let her hands fall from his cheeks. "Now you can go."

"I don't want to."

When she spoke, her tone straddled the line between desperate agreement and a soft reprimand. "Go."


	3. The Plan

**Mary Jane and the Monkey**

_If those two wittle nut-cwackers think they can out-smawt me, they've got another thing coming.  
- __Elmer J. Fudd_

**Three**

She tore through the jungle as fast as her petite legs would carry her, arms pumping, leaping over fallen logs and ducking under low-hanging branches with a deftness she was now well-acquainted with. The sounds of her three friends hurrying after her faded into the distance as she easily outran them. She heard Ginger bellow her name and demand that she slow down as she pulled the hem of her gown off the ground and tried to follow in her high-heels. Mr. Howell impatiently urged his wife forward as she did her best to keep up doing a rapid, yet still very dignified, walk.

The twenty-four hours was up.

Mary Ann had reluctantly returned to the cave upon completion of her part of the plan to find a weepy Mrs. Howell, an irate Mr. Howell, and an uncharacteristically tender Ginger, who grabbed her in a bone-crushing hug. The three women clung to each other as they waited out the remainder of the hunt, shrieking and gripping each other tighter at each gunshot that echoed across the island. They stared at Ginger's watch, telepathically willing the minute hand forward, as Mr. Howell paced restlessly in the background.

Occasionally they could make out the sounds of leaves rustling and branches breaking as Kincaid pursued Gilligan. Once there was a splash and a chorus of yells, indicating that the Skipper and the Professor had found them. And then silence.

Fifteen minutes after Gilligan left their clearing, Mary Ann was deliberately ambling through the jungle, staying out in the open and calculatingly making more noise than normal. Eventually, she sensed someone behind her.

"Hey!" Mary Ann didn't stop and she heard Kincaid pick up his pace behind her. "Mary Ann!" She turned and saw the hunter struggling towards her, fighting exhaustion, his face twisted in a livid scowl. "Where's your boyfriend?"

Mary Ann shrugged. "In Kansas."

"Don't play with me!" Kincaid spat. "You know who I mean!"

Mary Ann shook her head. "I haven't seen him."

"Of course you have! Why else would you be out here alone?" Kincaid suddenly grinned wickedly, eyebrows raised in amusement. "Came out to boost his spirits with a little afternoon delight?" He raised his rifle and she stumbled back a few steps. "Where are you hiding him?"

Mary Ann's features hardened in anger and she steeled her backbone, planting her hands on her hips. "I'm not afraid of you. You said shooting me would be like shooting the Easter Bunny."

Kincaid's eyes narrowed and he took a step towards her, but Mary Ann held her ground. "I have a newfound respect for Mr. Fudd," he growled and Mary Ann gasped as she felt the barrel of his rifle press into her abdomen.

By the look in his eyes, Mary Ann knew that Kincaid's inability to capture what he thought was easy prey was making him furious. All of her instincts told her not to give Gilligan up, but she had to remind herself that that was the plan. The plan had not, however, taken into consideration Kincaid's slow descent into island madness. He took another step towards her, the gun pushing her back until she collided with a palm tree.

Up on a small plateau nearly a quarter of a mile away, Gilligan peered from a dense thicket of plants and flowers, studying the scene playing out in the valley below. While he couldn't hear anything, he watched Mary Ann shrug coyly and Kincaid slowly lose his mind. Although the latter wasn't part of the original plan, Gilligan couldn't help but be amused at his effect on the skilled and poised marksman. That is, of course, until Gilligan saw him draw his weapon and advance on Mary Ann, pinning her to a palm tree with his rifle.

Gilligan reflexively stepped into the open and had to grab a nearby tree trunk to stop himself from barreling into the valley. "Come on, Mary Ann," he muttered impatiently.

Gilligan was just about to alter the plan and cry out to Kincaid himself when Mary Ann finally twisted around to look over her shoulder, pointing a shaky finger towards the plateau.

Kincaid's gaze rose to the plateau and an eager grin spread across his face. "Good girl." Kincaid pat Mary Ann roughly on the cheek and shouldered his rifle, her hands immediately landing on the bruised spot on her belly.

Kincaid tipped his hat politely at her and began towards the plateau when Mary Ann finally found her voice and stepped from the palm tree. "Be careful, Mr. Kincaid. There might be lions."

The hunter froze and turned back to her, head cocked inquisitively to one side. He watched her for a moment before realization dawned on him. The laugh started small, but soon was booming through the jungle, scaring animals from their dens and the castaways at the cave out of their wits. Kincaid pointed a wagging finger at Mary Ann. "Cute. Very cute."

Still chuckling, he began approaching the plateau again, waving cordially at the tiny red figure still standing out in the open. Gilligan flashed Mary Ann a grin before diving headfirst into the thicket and Kincaid picked up his pace across the valley.

Mary Ann couldn't move as she watched Kincaid reach the plateau and begin the laborious and ungainly climb. He plunged into the dense foliage at the top and Mary Ann held her breath. There was silence for a few moments until such a cacophony of noise erupted that Mary Ann had to clamp her hands over her ears.

First Kincaid screamed, then began yelling so incomprehensibly and intensely that Mary Ann almost believed for a moment that he very well may have encountered lions and not merely: "SNAKES!" That one clear word echoed through the valley. Mary Ann smiled at the thought of Jonathan Kincaid, word-famous hunter, being so irrationally afraid of snakes. It was a nice unexpected bonus to their plan that merely meant to startle him and slow him down.

"Why did it have to be _snakes_?"

Chaotic gunshots began ringing from the plateau and Mary Ann tightened her hands over her ears. She had to believe that Gilligan was out the other side of the grove and well on his way to his next hiding place as Kincaid shot haphazardly into the snakes' habitat. Birds rose from the canopy, screeching in protest as the hunter continued his unintelligible tirade against the reptiles.

She tore through the jungle now, running on a diluted concoction of fear, hope, and dread. They hadn't been able to hear anything else between the splash and subsequent yelling and the end of the hunt. There were no more sounds of pursuit through the jungle, no more voices, and no more gunshots. Now, however, there was the spectacular noise of Kincaid's helicopter rising from the beach, the rotating blades sending waves of wind across the island, ripping palm fronds from their trees and whipping Mary Ann's hair as she ran.

She skidded into the clearing to find the Skipper and the Professor huddled over a felled tree. They looked up as she stopped at the treeline, her eyes scanning the area for the first mate. "Where's –?" she began with dismay before she saw him crawling out of the hollow tree. "Gilligan!"

He barely had time to sit up in the sand before Mary Ann tackled him, nearly knocking him over backwards. Gilligan gasped for breath as Mary Ann hugged him tightly, talking so fast and kissing him on the cheek so much that he could barely make out anything she was saying. "Oh, Gilligan! It worked!" Mary Ann pulled back and took his face in her hands, beaming at him. "I'm so happy you're alive!" she exclaimed and kissed him firmly on the lips. "I knew you could do it!"

She threw her arms around him again as Ginger and the Howells emerged from the jungle. "Ooh, Gilligan!" Ginger squealed, "You're okay!" She dropped to her knees beside Mary Ann and began covering his other cheek with kisses.

Mr. Howell managed to clap Gilligan on the back and shake his hand between the two girls, offering him a heartfelt, "Good show, my boy," before his wife unceremoniously pushed him aside and descended on the young man as well.

"Oh, my dear, you're simply marvelous!"

"You're so brave, Gilligan!"

"I love you!"

"Thank goodness it's over!"

"We're so glad you're all right!"

Mr. Howell approached the Skipper and the Professor and threw an affable arm around each of their shoulders. "Gentlemen, if almost getting killed is all it takes to get this kind of reception from the ladies, I say we all take turns jumping in the quicksand."

The men laughed and exchanged warm handshakes, relieved and thrilled that their little family was still intact. A little worse for wear, perhaps, but intact nonetheless.

"Gilligan," the Professor began as he stepped forward, "what was all that commotion on the plateau? How did you buy yourself so much time?"

"Yeah, Little Buddy. What was Kincaid shooting at?"

Ginger and Mrs. Howell sat back in curiosity as Gilligan and Mary Ann shared a sly smile. "Lions."


	4. The Aftermath

**Mary Jane and the Monkey**

_Believe me, most mornings it comes as a relief to learn I'm awake. When dawn wells up in the sky, she knots me together.  
_Gilligan's Wake: A Novel by Tom Carson

**Four**

Over the next few weeks, Gilligan was plagued by nightmares of his ordeal. Barely able to sleep through the night, it eventually became nearly impossible for him to fall asleep at all. Ginger sang him lullabies, the Professor made another batch of the sleeping potion, Mr. Howell gave him sleeping pills, and Mrs. Howell gave him Mr. Howell's teddy bear. The Skipper even ordered him to go to sleep, but nothing could convince his eyes to stay closed like a good story.

Sometimes he would dream that Mary Ann, pinned to the palm tree by Kincaid's rifle, had refused to give him up and that Kincaid had, indeed, begun hunting rabbits.

On these nights, Gilligan awoke with a heartbroken gasp and jumped from his hammock. He would race across the clearing, slipping in the deep sand, and barge into the girls' hut just to make sure she was still there.

The girls would usher him inside and lay him down on Mary Ann's bed, his head in her lap and Ginger would listen as Mary Ann told stories until all three of them were sound asleep.

Sometimes he would dream that Kincaid had succeeded in capturing his prey. Oddly, these dreams weren't as bad as the other kind and they didn't jolt Gilligan awake. Instead, he would toss and turn in his hammock and unintentionally fling Teddy across the hut, groaning and whimpering until the Skipper couldn't stand to listen to it any longer.

On these nights, the Skipper would gently wake Mary Ann and bring her back to the crew's hut, apologizing the whole way. Mary Ann would stand by Gilligan's hammock and gently run her hand over his forehead while whispering to him. The Skipper would sit at the table watching, feeling as helpless as he was sure she felt trapped in the cave that day.

On nights when Gilligan was particularly agitated, Mary Ann eventually became exhausted, but refused to leave until he was calm, so the Skipper would pick both her and Teddy up and gently deposit them in the upper hammock next to the troubled sailor. The captain would climb into his hammock and watch as Gilligan instantly seemed to know she was there and curl up at her side.

He'd lay his head on her shoulder as Mary Ann hugged Teddy to her chest and gazed up at the ceiling, the hammock swaying gently beneath them.

Inevitably, the Skipper would hear the familiar opening phrase, "Once upon a time, there was a little girl who lived on a farm in Oklahoma named Mary Jane Winters," followed by an unconscious sleepy laugh and a contented sigh.

Mary Ann would feign annoyance and murmur her expected lines, "Be quiet, Gilligan. It's a good story. Now, listen."

On the sixth consecutive night of Mary Ann having to recount this same story to get Gilligan calm enough to sleep through the night, she paused before launching into her tale. She turned to peer down at the captain through the woven hemp of the upper hammock. "Sorry, Skipper," she whispered.

"Don't be, Mary Ann." He yawned and pulled his hat down over his face. "I love that story."

From then on, when the castaways were gathered around the fire after dinner talking and singing songs, thousands of tiny stars glittering brightly overhead, Gilligan would undoubtedly ask for a Mary Ann story and before he could place a request, one of the other castaways would demand to hear about Mary Jane and the monkey. Again. And they would sit in rapt attention, repeatedly reliving the spectacular victory of a little girl and her best friend over pure evil.

**Fin**


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